


Conceal

by kittensmctavish



Series: Buzzfeed Soulmates AU [3]
Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series), Buzzfeed: Worth It (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Bittersweet, Developing Friendships, Discovery, Gen, Realization, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-06
Updated: 2018-05-06
Packaged: 2019-05-03 02:22:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14558778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kittensmctavish/pseuds/kittensmctavish
Summary: Of course, someone was bound to find out.





	Conceal

**Author's Note:**

> Me: What part of this AU do I write next - fluff or angst?  
> My Brain: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANGST.  
> Me: 'cue gif from The Simpsons of Lunchlady Doris staring at SOMETHING that slightly alarms her before saying "Okey-dokey"'
> 
> (From the tags, you can probably guess who finds out.)

Of course, someone was bound to find out. 

***

You thought you had an extra tube of soul mark-covering concealer in your makeup stash, but nope. And there wasn’t anything in the now-empty tube to cover your mark that morning, and you weren’t going to be able to pick up new concealer until after work.

Not that running out of concealer was ever really a problem. After all, your mark was on your ankle, and you always wore long socks or boots to cover it up. But…you know…better safe than sorry.

…whatever. You sigh, tug some fun-printed socks on before slipping into a pair of clogs and head to work. It’s just one day. What could happen?

***

Early morning for you. One of the equipment storage rooms needs cleaning and rearranging.

Lots of moving lights and stands and climbing ladders and physical work.

From the state of the room when you walk in – complete disarray – no one likes doing this shit. Everything’s haphazard and basically stacked in a pile in a corner and you wince because it’s…not gonna be fun.

Anyway, before shit can get ORGANIZED, shit needs to get CLEANED. And heaven help your allergies, the shelves are dusty as fuuuuuck.

So you bunch up your sleeves, roll up your jeans, and clean. At the very least, you can get THAT part done so when more people arrive at the office, you won’t have to do the bulk of moving stuff.

You dust and sweep and mop, moving some of the stuff as you go in order to clean the whole space. As you move things, you attempt to at least sort them into piles so actually putting everything away later isn’t as much of a struggle.

Time passes; you’re not sure how much, but a cleaning spree does that to you, you kind of get lost in it, as weird as that sounds. You’re up high on a tall ladder, finishing dusting all the shelves, surrounding by dust particles floating in the air and a faint scent of lemon. The fluorescent lights hum, providing a calming white noise, and you’re just kind of in a zone.

That is, until someone softly says your name.

You jolt with a declaration of “FUCK!” and cling to the ladder, dropping your dirty dusty dish towel and can of Pledge. When you’ve recovered your balance, you look down.

“GODdamn it, Adam, for FUCK’s sake!”

The man is a goddamn ninja, silent-er than the silent-est of things. At the very least, there is a tinge of apology on his face, rather than the ever-present mask of neutrality. And he’s holding the ladder firmly, to ensure that it doesn’t (didn’t?) fall.

“Sorry,” he murmurs.

“It’s okay, just…knock or something next time?” you say as you begin to descend the ladder. He nods. “Cool.”

“How long have you been here?” he asks, watching you step down carefully.

“Not sure.” You pause about halfway down the ladder and fish your phone out of your pocket to check the time. “Two hours? Christ…anyone else here yet that was gonna help organize?”

No response right away. You look away from your phone, at Adam. He’s staring at you with…wider eyes than he usually stares at things/people/in general. “Adam?” He blinks and looks down.

“Yeah,” he says.

“Cool.” You step down the rest of the way. As soon as both your feet are safely on the floor, Adam lets go of the ladder and walks away without a word.

That’s…weird.

…is it because you swore at him? …that was kind of mean of you, admittedly. And as unexpected as his appearance was, it didn’t warrant such profanity being hurled his way. (Nothing Adam ever did warranted profanities being hurled at him.)

You roll your jean legs back down and smooth them out before absent-mindedly tugging your socks back up before standing upright.

You’re pretty sure you have enough time to get some water and stop by the break room to see if anyone brought any baked goods.

***

The day passes quickly. The room gets fully organized, editing goes quickly, Sara stops by with a camera at some point to ask you and Shane and Ryan for your opinion on her “space buns” curly hairstyle (to which you respond, “You know, if you did a whole bunch of those, you’d look like Bjork from that one video. The one where she looks like this. …put a picture of her where I’m pointing.”)

As the day dies down and people trickle out, you’re finishing up work on a video (half an hour left of work, tops). Shane left, like, ten minutes ago. Next to you, Ryan makes a show of stretching with a satisfied sigh.

“Okay. I’m out,” he says, standing as his computer screen goes dark. He claps a hand on your shoulder. “Don’t stay too late, okay?” 

“You’re not my boss,” you say, rolling your eyes. Ryan laughs. You shrug your shoulder out of his grasp. “I’m almost done. Get outta here, nerd.”

“Okay. See you tomorrow, nerd.” He ruffles your hair as he walks away, and you reach up to push his arm away, pretending to look affronted but well aware that you’ve got probably the stupidest smile on your face. As he turns away to leave, you face your computer again, finishing up the last edits and clicking the magical “save it all” button. Which…yeah, saving still takes a bag-of-dicks-long time, so you can’t rejoice just yet. So you sway back and forth in your chair, swinging to one side and then the other, eventually pushing your feet to spin in full. It’s fun until your stomach starts to spin, and then you stop. Saving is…fifteen percent done. You sigh and rest your chin on your folder hand, staring at the progress bar turn green very Very VERY slowly…

Your reverie is interrupted at a tap on your shoulder and the quiet question of your name. You turn your head.

“Hey Adam,” you say, lifting your head. “What’s up?”

“Hey,” he says. “Can I talk to you about something?” You glance at your screen quickly. SEVENTEEN percent saved now. What progress.

“Sure,” you say, standing up. Adam turns and begins to walk. You’re a little confused, but you follow him. The office is mostly empty, so…why he’s leading you somewhere private to talk about…whatever he wants to talk about is a little weird. But you’re not going to question it.

You end up in one of the smaller rooms usually used for shoots and interviews. There’s a couch set up, and Adam stops in front of it, evidently waiting for you to sit first. So you sit. And he sits. And he folds his hands and looks down at them, not at you. He seems hesitant to start talking, which has you a little unnerved.

“So…if this is about this morning,” you being to speak (if he’s not going to), “I’m sorry for swearing at you. That was uncool of me and—”

“I saw your mark,” Adam says, almost in a rush. 

As hushed as Adam speaks, it’s the loudest statement. It doesn’t fully register at first.

“This morning…I saw your soul mark,” he repeats, quieter, as though afraid that somehow, someone will still hear. He looked up at you, eyes flickering almost with regret at what he’s said. 

Which, by the way, is still registering, and your brain is playing over this morning wondering how he could have—

Your socks.

You remember now, pulling up your socks after rolling your jeans back down.

Your socks had fallen to show your ankles. And your mark wasn’t concealed because you’d run out of concealer.

And you’d stopped on the ladder at the point where Adam’s line of sight would’ve been right at your ankles meaning he would have been able to see the ghost and he would have put two and two together and figured out that—

“I know Ryan’s your soulmate,” he whispers.

You’re unsure of how your face reads now. Probably pure horror. Shock. Terror?

“Adam…I…” Words are hard now. Your face is hot, your heart is pounding in your ears, you know there’s no way anyone else could have seen but you DON’T KNOW, and you don’t know if—

“I haven’t told anyone,” Adam interrupts, pulling the emergency brake on the rushing train of thoughts in your head. “I won’t. But I thought you should know I know.”

“Thank you.” It’s almost desperate, all relief. “I can’t…” Words are still hard to come by. You don’t know how much you need to explain to Adam. …you’re not sure if he even wants an explanation, or how much he deserves one. And as the relief sinks in, one question rings in your head.

“Why are you telling me this?”

Adam looks back up at you. His face is blank as always, but his eyes…they speak volumes for him. There’s a sadness there that’s…familiar.

Without speaking, he bends down to untie his left shoe, slipping it off and pulling down his sock.

There, on his ankle, is a slice of cake, traced on his ankle in a gold-flecked red outline.

First, just…shock reeling that Adam does indeed have a soul mark. No one in the office has ever been quite sure if he DID have one. So you’re a little…struck by how Adam is trusting you with this, even if you haven’t figured out WHY he’s trusting you with this.

The slice of cake…you’ve seen this shape before. It takes a moment to connect the dots for you, a mark that’s familiar, racking your brain to remember where and who…

…and you remember certain Tasty videos. The Japan episodes of “Worth It”. 

The same slice of cake on Rie’s collarbone, peeking out from the neck of her shirt. Unchanged in color. Waiting for a meeting.

And their interactions onscreen together in those episodes make so much more sense now…mostly, how Adam looked at Rie…a man normally so stoic suddenly so…animated around her. Smiling with her, at her, watching her with the kind of heart-eyes that could rival the heart-eyes Andrew gives Steven on a regular basis.

It’s…so obvious with this new knowledge.

You silently watch as the red mark is covered once again by argyle sock and boot is donned. When you look up at Adam, he’s even more pointedly not looking at you. You think his eyes are shining from behind his glasses, but you aren’t quite sure.

“I won’t tell anyone. Promise,” you whisper. Adam nods. “Does anyone else know?” He shakes his head. “She doesn’t know?” He shakes his head.

You want to ask him why he hasn’t told her. From what you know of Rie (which is, admittedly, very little), she’s not opposed to finding her soulmate.

“If she’s happy, I’m happy,” he says, as though sensing you wanting to ask him. “She’s happy being friends. I’m fine with that.”

You say the same thing about Ryan (to yourself, to your sister). That he’s with Helen. That he’s happy being friends with you. And that that’s enough for you.

So you don’t believe Adam for a goddamn second. 

You reach out and place a hand over his knee. He doesn’t look up at you, but his hand goes over yours, which you follow with your other hand. You run your thumb over the top of his hand, as though that can try to help soothe the dull ache of unrequited soulmates you know he probably feels because you feel it almost every moment.

You sniff, which makes Adam look up at you. With his free hand, he reaches up to brush a tear away. Before he does that, you’re unaware that you’d started crying.

“I know,” is all he says.

***

When you get back to your desk, Adam’s phone number is now in your phone, and the save has progressed to an impressive 52 percent.

Adam wanders over at about 68 percent and sits in Ryan’s chair, the two of you watching the bar reach a full green 100 in silence.

When all programs are closed and computer is finally shut off, you both walk out to your respective cars. You text Adam the directions to this little diner that you absolutely love that he’s apparently never been to. 

Milkshakes are your treat; all he owes you is shared commiseration. (And maybe a few of his fries.)

On your way home, you stop by the drugstore and pick up three tubes of soul mark concealer.

Your soul hurts a little less than it always does. 

***

If anyone was bound to find out, you’re okay with it being Adam.

**Author's Note:**

> (Every time during those Japan episodes that Rie and Adam were onscreen together, I was just all smiles. They were just so fucking cute together. So, of course, I had to make that sad. It's what I do.)
> 
> Feedback welcome and appreciated.


End file.
